So I'm sittin here with Kerry Getz at the Nocturnal skateboard shop on beautiful 3rd street just off South in the heart of Philly. One of the things I want to start out by saying is congrats man on winning the first ever true street event in the X Games.
Yeah, it's pretty exciting man especially here in the town that I live, so it's pretty good.

What did you think, did you have any expectations going into it about the set-up of the event or anything like that?
I had some say. Like in setting stuff up you know, like what I thought would be cool. Add some rails here and there, flat bars, just so we could cruise around and flow up and down the stairs. Wood up and down the stairs so, it worked out great man.

The boys getting due respect in one of Philly's biggest busts.

That's awesome. Did you have anything to do with the "Golden Rail?" The rail that was set up down the middle of the seven set of stairs?
Yeah, I was right there and I did the measurements and everything - the whole thing. Like I was saying, "all right, this is the way I want it. I want it square I want it this high and so and so and then we measured it out, I eyed it up and they welded it right there.

Do you have a construction or design background that helps you with that?
It's my mind you know it's just what I would like to skate you know? And I know what everybody else enjoys skating so I pretty much just went with that.

Yeah I heard this funny story that, well obviously City Hall and Love Park is the full bust zone for skateboarding in Philadelphia, so first day when they were setting up the competition and these dudes are drilling into the ground of City Hall to set up the rails. And all these police got freaked out because they didn't know what was going on and started approaching these people and were like, "What the hell are you doing?" And then out busts this permit and it was like "Da-da-da-dum!"
Yeah, yeah. Well they had the permit to do the whole course or whatever but they really didn't say they were going to drill holes till the last minute. And I guess the city pretty much went for it. They talked it over and were like, "look, it's only gonna be 6 holes it's not going to be that big of a deal." Because they were filming because that's really the only way to hold the rail up, that would be stable.

Anchor bolting it to the ground.
Yeah.

It's funny because they almost kind of had to stealth it.
Yeah, yeah…

Don Bostick breaks it down for the competitors.

A lot of people have been saying, "cool, this is the first 'true' street event." Or the first "true" event in the X Games. Do you have any thoughts as to whether one, it's "true." Or two, whether it's beneficial to the X Games or just another thing they're trying out?
Well I hope they do it in every city they go to. You know, find the main skate spot that everybody goes to and have the contest there, I think it's one of the best ideas. I mean the park skating is street too, you're going to adapt your street tricks to that park, no matter if it's made out of wood or whatever. But to ride on marble like on a real street spot is where it's at. Going to city hall, driving to City Hall and not driving to some built skatepark is where it's at. I mean they need to do more stuff like that, the cities need to give more permits to have contests like that.

How was the feeling of being in your hometown, like were any of your old friends or family there watching the event?
Well I'm from two hours away I didn't grow up here. But a lot of my family didn't come down because I was like there's a contest next weekend that's the real X Games, like the park one, and there's gonna be better seating and stuff because I didn't know how this one was gonna go over. So even if they came, they probably wouldn't have been able to see too well. So that's kind of why I didn't invite everybody down, I didn't know how it was gonna turn out. Then a lot of people were complaining that they couldn't see, so it was a good thing that I told 'em not to come down. But then I'm kinda bummed because I did well. My dad probably would have been stoked to see me win.

Check back for Part Two of this interview and hear what Kerry has to say about his shop, FDR, helmets, and those damn Philly cops.

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